Improvement of the Mediterranean Agro-Silvopastoral System Montado

Montado is an old man-made agro-silvopastoral system, with three vegetation components (trees, shrubs and herbs) used for multiple species animal husbandry in extensive production systems (Potes & Babo, 2003). Several authors have reported on the improvement of Mediterranean annual self-reseeding pastures (Espejo-Diaz, 1996) and increased stocking rates

Estudio descriptivo del programa de rehabilitación cardiaca de la Clínica Las Américas

Estudio descriptivo de antes y después que demuestra la eficacia y seguridad del Programa de Rehabilitación Cardiaca de la Clínica Las Américas, con base en un seguimiento a 77 pacientes, en el que se evidenció mejoría de la capacidad funcional así como disminución del perímetro abdominal y de las cifras basales de presión arterial sistólica y diastólica sin complicaciones severas, en todos los tipos de paciente, independientemente de la fracción de eyección o las variables demográficas. De igual forma, se describen las características epidemiológicas de la población y de los factores de riesgo cardio-cerebro-vascular.A before and after descriptive study that shows the efficacy and safety of the Cardiac Rehabilitation Program of the Clínica Las Americas, based on the follow-up of 77 patients in which we evidenced improvement in functional capacity as well as a decrease of abdominal girth and baseline values of systolic and diastolic blood pressure without severe complications in all type of patients, regardless of ejection fraction or demographic variables. Likewise, we describe the epidemiological characteristics of the population and the cardio-cerebro-vascular risk factors

Cloud Screening and Quality Control Algorithm for Star Photometer Data: Assessment with Lidar Measurements and with All-sky Images

This paper presents the development and set up of a cloud screening and data quality control algorithm for a star photometer based on CCD camera as detector. These algorithms are necessary for passive remote sensing techniques to retrieve the columnar aerosol optical depth, delta Ae(lambda), and precipitable water vapor content, W, at nighttime. This cloud screening procedure consists of calculating moving averages of delta Ae() and W under different time-windows combined with a procedure for detecting outliers. Additionally, to avoid undesirable Ae(lambda) and W fluctuations caused by the atmospheric turbulence, the data are averaged on 30 min. The algorithm is applied to the star photometer deployed in the city of Granada (37.16 N, 3.60 W, 680 ma.s.l.; South-East of Spain) for the measurements acquired between March 2007 and September 2009. The algorithm is evaluated with correlative measurements registered by a lidar system and also with all-sky images obtained at the sunset and sunrise of the previous and following days. Promising results are obtained detecting cloud-affected data. Additionally, the cloud screening algorithm has been evaluated under different aerosol conditions including Saharan dust intrusion, biomass burning and pollution events

Sucesión de Polygnátidos (Conodontos) del Emsiense (Devónico Inferior) en los Pirineos Centrales Españoles

A comprehensive conodont study of five sections of Emsian age, carried out in the Spanish Central Pyrenees, has revealed an important succession of polygnathids that can be used for identifying basal boundaries of globally recognized biozones. This succession consists of Polygnathus excavatus excavatus, Po. gronbergi, Po. nothoperbonus, Po. mashkovae, Po. laticostatus, and the new species Polygnathus luciae that allows the identification of the excavatus, nothoperbonus and laticostatus Zones. The nothoperbonus Zone is further subdivided into Lower and Upper nothoperbonus subzones, relying upon the lowest occurrence of Po. mashkovae. These biostratigraphic data from the Spanish Central Pyrenees corroborate the succession of conodont indexes in other regions of Europe (north-western France and southern Italy), North Africa (Morocco), Central Asia, Australia, and North America (Alaska, Nevada and Canada).El estudio exhaustivo de cinco secciones de edad Emsiense en el Pirineo Central Español ha proporcionado una importante sucesión de especies de conodontos del género Polygnathus que puede usarse para reconocer los límites de diferentes biozonas de aplicación global. Esta sucesión consiste en Polygnathus excavatus excavatus, Po. gronbergi, Po. nothoperbonus, Po. mashkovae, Po. laticostatus y la nueva especie Polygnathus luciae, lo que permite identificar las biozonas excavatus, nothoperbonus y laticostatus. Además, el primer registro de Po. mashkovae se usa para subdividir la Zona nothoperbonus en las Subzonas nothoperbonus Inferior y Superior. Estos datos corroboran la sucesión de los índices de conodontos registrada en otras regiones de Europa (noroeste de Francia y sur de Italia), norte de África (Marruecos), Asia central, Australia y Norte América (Alaska, Nevada y Canadá)

Development and validation of a new methodological platform to measure behavioral, cognitive, and physiological responses to food interventions in real time

To fully understand the causes and mechanisms involved in overeating and obesity, measures of both cognitive and physiological determinants of eating behavior need to be integrated. Effectively synchronizing behavioral measures such as meal micro-structure (e.g., eating speed), cognitive processing of sensory stimuli, and metabolic parameters, can be complex. However, this step is central to understanding the impact of food interventions on body weight. In this paper, we provide an overview of the existing gaps in eating behavior research and describe the development and validation of a new methodological platform to address some of these issues. As part of a controlled trial, 76 men and women self-served and consumed food from a buffet, using a portion-control plate with visual stimuli for appropriate amounts of main food groups, or a conventional plate, on two different days, in a random order. In both sessions participants completed behavioral and cognitive tests using a novel methodological platform that measured gaze movement (as a proxy for visual attention), eating rate and bite size, memory for portion sizes, subjective appetite and portion-size perceptions. In a sub-sample of women, hormonal secretion in response to the meal was also measured. The novel platform showed a significant improvement in meal micro-structure measures from published data (13 vs. 33% failure rate) and high comparability between an automated gaze mapping protocol vs. manual coding for eye-tracking studies involving an eating test (ICC between methods 0.85; 90% CI 0.74, 0.92). This trial was registered at Clinical Trials.gov with Identifier NCT03610776

Analysis of urinary potassium isotopes and association with pancreatic health: healthy, diabetic and cancerous states

Background: More than 700 million people worldwide suffer from diseases of the pancreas, such as diabetes, pancreatitis and pancreatic cancer. Often dysregulation of potassium (K+) channels, co-transporters and pumps can promote development and progression of many types of these diseases. The role of K+ transport system in pancreatic cell homeostasis and disease development remains largely unexplored. Potassium isotope analysis (δ41K), however, might have the potential to detect minute changes in metabolic processes relevant for pancreatic diseases. Methods: We assessed urinary K isotope composition in a case-control study by measuring K concentrations and δ41K in spot urines collected from patients diagnosed with pancreatic cancer (n=18), other pancreas-related diseases (n=14) and compared those data to healthy controls (n=16). Results: Our results show that urinary K+ levels for patients with diseased pancreas (benign and pancreatic cancer) are significantly lower than the healthy controls. For δ41K, the values tend to be higher for individuals with pancreatic cancer (mean δ41K = -0.58 ± 0.33‰) than for healthy individuals (mean δ41K = -0.78 ± 0.19‰) but the difference is not significant (p=0.08). For diabetics, urinary K+ levels are significantly lower (p=0.03) and δ41K is significantly higher (p=0.009) than for the healthy controls. These results suggest that urinary K+ levels and K isotopes can help identify K disturbances related to diabetes, an associated factors of all-cause mortality for diabetics. Conclusion: Although the K isotope results should be considered exploratory and hypothesis-generating and future studies should focus on larger sample size and δ41K analysis of other K-disrupting diseases (e.g., chronic kidney disease), our data hold great promise for K isotopes as disease marker

Genetic diversity and population structure of Ascochyta rabiei from the western Iranian Ilam and Kermanshah provinces using MAT and SSR markers

Knowledge of genetic diversity in A. rabiei provides different levels of information that are important in the management of crop germplasm resources. Gene flow on a regional level indicates a significant potential risk for the regional spread of novel alleles that might contribute to fungicide resistance or the breakdown of resistance genes. Simple sequence repeat (SSR) and mating type (MAT) markers were used to determine the genetic structure, and estimate genetic diversity and the prevalence of mating types in 103 Ascochyta rabiei isolates from seven counties in the Ilam and Kermanshah provinces of western Iran (Ilam, Aseman abad, Holaylan, Chardavol, Dareh shahr, Gilangharb, and Sarpul). A set of 3 microsatellite primer pairs revealed a total of 75 alleles; the number of alleles varied from 15 to 34 for each marker. A high level of genetic variability was observed among A. rabiei isolates in the region. Genetic diversity was high (He = 0.788) within populations with corresponding high average gene flow and low genetic distances between populations. The smallest genetic distance was observed between isolates from Ilam and Chardavol. Both mating types were present in all populations, with the majority of the isolates belonging to Mat1-1 (64%), but within populations the proportions of each mating type were not significantly different from 50%. Results from this study will be useful in breeding for Ascochyta blight-resistant cultivars and developing necessary control measures

Signature inversion in semi-decoupled bands: Residual interaction between h9/2 protons and i13/2 neutrons

Semi-decoupled bands based on the πh9/2 ⊗ vi13/2 configuration are observed in 162Tm,164Tm and 174Ta. Spins assigned to these bands imply an inversion of the expected signature splitting, which is interpreted as being the result of a residual proton-neutron interactionComisión Interministerial de Ciencia y Tecnología PB95-0533US Dept. of Energy DE-FGOS- 92ER4069